Reading Hipster Christianity (2010) by Brett McCracken has been a far more personal journey than I anticipated.
He opens with a history of hip and cool. Since I like history, it was a good way to begin for me. He went back to Rousseau and Beau Brummel, but the real beginning was America and its individualism. Yes, Marx and the Frankfurt School come into the discussion. Although I like some of the insights of Rousseau, his philosophy led directly to the mob violence exhibited in the French Revolution. Although Karl Marx had some interesting philosophical insights, his philosophy led directly to the communist tyranny and violence of the 1900’s. Philosophically, I have had to go another direction, which includes appreciation for Plato, Aristotle, Descartes, Leibniz, Malebranch, Locke, Hume, Kant, Federalist Papers, and Hegel. Both groups are “revolutionary,” but only one has expanded human freedom and sought to develop institutions and a culture that respects that freedom. Of course, the 1960’s would be the primary origin of hip/cool, with Bob Dylan, Alan Ginsberg, Jack Kerouac, and William S. Burroughs. I remember reading another book he mentions, Theodore Roszak, Making of a Counter Culture. The Beatles, the Stones, Woodstock, The Graduate, and Easy Rider were all part of it. Yet, what happens when hip and cool become mainstream?
I note that McCracken does not mention Nietzsche. In my recent experience, people who travel this road usually like reading Nietzsche. He seems to express the sense of individuality and loneliness that many hipsters value.
For hip Christianity, the origin is the Jesus People. He refers to Lonnie Frisbee, Chuck Smith, and Calvary Chapel, all of which I, apparently, missed. On the other hand, I have had some contact with the Vineyard movement, which is part of this stream of contemporary church life. The people in this movement tended to see Jesus as someone like himself or herself, that is, a hippie and a rebel.
The journey with this book became personal when he explored the Christian rock music of the 60’s and 70’s. Of course, Godspell and Jesus Christ Superstar were both musicals to which I listened and watched often. Among my favorite bands were Chuck Girard, Love Song, Randy Matthews, and Larry Norman. I am glad for the exposure to Sufjan Stevens, an icon in the Christian hip music, but someone of whom I have never heard. Hillsong and David Crowder are big in some of these churches, but they can go many directions, including new versions of hymns.
The book continues through some modern efforts at hip. Relevant magazine is part of it. They do not like Dobson, Falwell, Robertson, TBN, or Osteen. I probably dislike less than hipsters do, simply because I see some value in their advice on family, for example, and because it is probably my nature to find some good in what other Christians do and believe. They do like Hauerwas, N. T. Wright, Ron Sider, Jim Wallis, The Imitation of Christ, Flannery O’Connor, Wendell Berry, Thomas Merton, Yoder, Brugemann, Brendan Manning, Eugene Peterson, C. S. Lewis, G. K. Chesterton, Henri Nouwen, Soren Kierkegaard, de Chardin, Paul Tillich, Catholic tradition, and Orthodox tradition.
Although I do not personally have a positive reaction to all of this, I am acquainted with it all, and like much of it. In my twenties and thirties, I struggled with my own spiritual experience, with Christian theology, with my intellectual journey, with my politics, and with my experience of Christian community. It reminds me of some adults, who were being overly protective, I think, warning of the dangers of rock music. Some tried to prove that the beat itself was evil. It also reminds me of other adults who were quite willing to work with us, disciple us. They helped us think through our faith, as well as feel it. They helped us with what it meant for how we lived our lives now, and not just happy that we were saved and going to heaven.
Merton and Nouwen both helped me to pray by broadening and deepening my experience – meditation, listening, silence, and solitude becoming important to me.
The music helped to connect me to faith, for rock music was the music of my youth. Although I have since broadened to include many other forms, it is still the music of my soul.
I have rejected the Leftist politics of Hauerwas, Sider, and Wallis. It focuses on Jesus of Nazareth and his non-violence, simplicity of lifestyle, peacemaking, love of creation, and a radical social critique of money and power. This book has helped me understand why I have rejected it. Its view of Jesus opens itself to the criticism of Jews and Muslims that the historical Jesus is nothing more than an idol, making absolute what was said in an historically contingent situation. It also opens itself to the criticism that it levels against the Christian right, namely, that it claimed Jesus endorsed its politics. The political Left now has its version of the same mistake. Ultimately, this brand of politics is one rooted in alienation and rebellion, as if alienation and rebellion have the final word in the relationship between church and culture. I have come to understand the relationship differently, with the help of George Will, William F. Buckley, Milton Friedman, who were all part of that journey. The journey eventually included the Federalist Papers, the Constitution, John Lock, and Adam Smith. The critique of people like Bishop Willimon is that these people were largely not Christian. They were Enlightenment people, and therefore rationalists. Granting some of this critique, this country has its foundation in a revolution oriented to the individual and freedom, both values of the hipster. Of course, the United States has plenty of sins, past and present. The assumption seems to be that these cultures were somehow “better” than western civilization. To offer an extreme example, when the Spaniards entered Latin America in the 1400’s, the Aztecs were involved in human sacrifice on a massive scale, preferring to capture enemies than kill them so that they could make such sacrifices to their gods. It was brutal, cutting open the chest in order to take out the still beating heart. This behavior repelled the Europeans. It ought not to surprise us that western civilization imperfectly applied its ideals. Human beings still ran its institutions. Yet, its core principle is that of respect for individuals and therefore freedom. What makes one American is not so much the geography as an idea, and that idea involves liberty. As a contrast to Willimon, theologian Wolfhart Pannenberg has said that Western Civilization is not so evil that the church cannot enter into dialogue with it and make it a better culture in which to live. Yes, that means individualism, capitalism, and limited government all have redeeming qualities with which the church can work. What this says to me is that church and culture are not “counter” to each other; they do not exist in alienation, but in a reconciling relationship. Notice, in writing “reconciling,” the point is that the reconciliation is on-going, not complete now, and therefore a tension exists. For these reasons, I cannot go the direction of Rob Bell and Shane Claiborne, contemporary hipsters.
Theologically, I find myself entering into respectful dialogue with Roman Catholic and Orthodox tradition. This also leads to awareness of the global church. Pannenberg has helped me with that, although Nouwen and Merton prepared me for this. I connect with Kierkegaard at personal levels, but I also find myself saddened. He led a lonely life, that of the isolated individual. He ended his life alienated from his country and his church, as evidenced by his Attack Upon Christendom. He ended his life in rebellion. I like de Chardin and Paul Tillich, largely because both enter into dialogue with culture at the level of science, psychology, sociology, and philosophy. Undoubtedly, this is where I differ the most with hip culture. I do not want to lead my Christian life in alienation from the nation in which I live.
Among the television shows he mentions, Lost and Mad Men are shows I liked, but 30 Rock, I did not. I do not watch The Daily Show or The Colbert Report. I have not watched past the first season of The Office. I hear about shows like Sons of Anarchy, Jersey Shore, Breaking Bad, and Project Runway, but have not watched them yet.
He refers to some churches that attract Christian hipsters. Mars Hill church in Seattle, Grace Church Hackney in London, Mosaic in Los Angeles, Life on the Vine in Long Grove, IL, Mars Hill Bible Church in Grandville, MI, Jacob’s Well in Kansas City, MO, Resurrection Presbyterian in Brooklyn. These churches are media savvy, fashionably designed, and friendly to art and culture. They are interested in justice and serving, and not just saving, those outside the walls of the church. I will spending some time reading more about these churches and pastors.
In the end, McCracken thinks that Christianity cannot be hip, because it cannot be as wedded to individualism, alienation, sense of superiority over those uncool, too focused on now, rebellion, and focus on the visual.
I suppose I am not hip or cool. However, I like the appreciation of the arts that hipsters bring to the table. “Life is good,” he says, and too many Christians, I think, give the impression that it is not. We should be able to appreciate nature and culture, I think. Much of the preaching in the churches he mentions involve technology, and I do that when I can, which is often, but not every Sunday. It can be dialogue as well, and I do not do this as much as I could. I recently gave a sermon that featured Mahalia Jackson, I have preached on the Song of Solomon, I like using visual images in messages, I like jazz, and I like Sufjan Stevens.
Maybe part of the point is that you not try to be cool or hip, but that you be yourself. After all, you have a gift to give. If you do not offer it, you will deny to the world the gift you are and have. In realizing that, maybe you are hip or cool, in your own unique way. If you have to try to be hip, you have already lost. Maybe that is the point.
Another point is to listen spiritually and intuitively. Young Christians who become involved in this movement do not need simple affirmation, but they do not need simple rejection either. There are valid concerns they have about Christianity and about this country to which those of us who are now adult need to listen. My own hope would be that they will recognize that rebellion and alienation from Christian history and from America need not be final. Christianity and America are both self-reforming enough to shape a new future. However, if you remain at the point of alienation and rebellion, you will not be part of that new future.
